


Do I Fight Or Let It Die?

by dear_monday



Series: As Simple As Faith [1]
Category: Bandom, My Chemical Romance, The Used
Genre: Alternate Universe - Supernatural, Crossover: American Gods, M/M, Unrequited Love, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-28
Updated: 2011-11-28
Packaged: 2017-10-26 15:39:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,774
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/284957
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dear_monday/pseuds/dear_monday
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Gods">American Gods</a> crossover. As people are forgetting their stories and finding new things to believe in, the old gods are fading and new ones are bursting fully-formed into the world. Anarchy is drowning in paperwork and regulations, while powders and pills pick up new disciples every day. Stars rise and fall, horns blare, glass shatters, streetlights falter into life. A man walks into a bar.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Do I Fight Or Let It Die?

**Author's Note:**

> Warning for discussion of main character death (past and imminent).
> 
>  **Edit!** Now with podfic ([LJ](http://dapatty.livejournal.com/82944.html) | [DW](http://dapatty.dreamwidth.org/2309.html)) by [dapatty](http://dapatty.livejournal.com).

A man walks into a bar.

Or, well.

Almost. It's nearly that simple. He's half a man and twice a man and something in between on the alternate Thursdays when he's in a fit state to remember. He's unsettling and ill-fitting, pieced together from sweat and junkies' desperation and cold, hard cash – if you can bear to look close enough (and if it's in your power to hold him still), you can just about see the seams. He has halogen-bright highway arteries, all the better to see you with – no, that can't be right; that's eyes, and his are dark with distended pupils the colour of the universe's underbelly. He's selling the dirty thrill of back-alley sorcery, an unshaven almost-human hurricane worshipped by millions.

A man walks into a bar.

There are enough people who recognise him even through the dim, grimy light of the place, their heads jerking hopefully towards him. Hooked, lines and sinkers. He ignores them. They aren't what he's here for, not today. He crosses the room slowly – why rush when you've got all the time in the world? He then takes a seat at the bar, orders enough alcohol to fell a small giant, and sets about drinking enough of it to put a messy buzz under his skin.

(Booze, buzz. Bastard. We'll call him Bert.)

He drops his glass and doesn't wait to hear it shatter on the greasy tiles.

He turns to the aging punk next to him, and the smile he wears is broad and bright and just a little unhinged.

"Hello, motherfucker," he says. "Did you miss me?"

The punk doesn't look surprised, probably because he isn't. It takes a lot to surprise him these days. He's seen a lot, more than enough to make him brutally honest, except when it suits him; not cruel, just – Frank. His skin is mapped with ink and battle scars, almost measure for measure, but there's still enough search&destroy throbbing in his veins and enough fuckthiswholewideworld under his nails and tucked between his vertebrae.

"You again," he says, and he punches Bert in the face. Bert doesn't even try to dodge or retaliate, just sits and smiles beatifically and savours the sick crunch and the pulsating starburst of blinding-bright pain. There's something dark running from his nose down over his mouth, and he spits a thread of the same stuff onto the floor.

"First blood," he says, licking his lips. It isn't, not quite, but it's close enough that Frank doesn't bother to correct him. Bert feints to one side and then the other, jerky and wired-quick, and sinks his nicotine-stained teeth into Frank's forearm – _inksweatpetrol_. Frank hisses and throws him off, sending a chair clattering across the floor. Bert's smile widens again as he feels Frank seize his arm and twist until the bones start to protest. Bert goes limp for just long enough for Frank's grip to loosen, then grins bloody-mouthed as his fingers wrap around Frank's throat. They hit the floor together, toothandnail, hellforleather.

Everyone's watching now, shouting, abuse and encouragement tangling in the air. Good. This is good, this is what they wanted. Smaller scuffles start to blossom at the edges of the room, and as Frank drives his elbow into Bert's stomach, he suddenly seems a little younger, a little brighter, his tattoos a little sharper against his skin.

 _Yes_.

With a surge of new strength, he slams Bert against the floor, straddling his hips to hold him down and digging his fingers into the soft spot behind his collar bone. Bert writhes and spits and glows, because this is why they do this, this is what Frank needs; the fierce euphoria and the bloody joy of hell-raising.

Bert catches Frank's answering nasty grin between his teeth and tucks it away to remind himself that as long as they've got this, they've got a chance.  


  


+

  


Afterwards, they sit shoulder-to-shoulder on the sidewalk (something old; something new), passing a single cigarette back and forth between them like a blessing. The world doesn't give a shit, and walks on by.

"I don't fucking get you," says Frank. "Everyone knows the old gods are dying out. You should be grinding my face into the fucking dirt. You should be – you should be fucking letting people forget." _Not reminding them, not keeping me here_. "It's like... I don't know, are you getting your fucking kicks out of this or something? Seeing how long you can keep me around?"

Bert cuts him an amused sidelong glance. "Dude," he says. "You think _that's_ how I get my kicks? You want anything for that black eye? I've been saving the good shit for you. I'll give you a discount and everything."

Frank huffs a laugh into the warm, diesel-heavy air. "Point," he concedes. "No thanks. But I still don't get why you're so fucking set on keeping me alive. It's gonna happen one day, you know."

"Nah, not you. You're not gonna die. Chaos never does, right? You're the fucking patron saint of anarchy. You're gonna be around forever."

It's about as far from true as anything could be and they both know it. This evening will be enough to hold Frank down for a while – the lines around his eyes are fainter and he's bright with strength again – but it's like trying to hold back the tide with the occasional bar fight.

"You should see them," says Frank with sudden venom. "All, all – forms and rules and fucking is-it-okay-if-I."

Bert shifts a little closer, nudging his shoulder against Frank's. "Hey," he says. "Don't talk like that. There are still parties and riots and shit every day, right?"

"Not like there used to be. It's all planned and organised. Defeats the fucking point, you know? Makes me fucking sick. I'm _glad_ I'm not gonna be around much longer."

"Alright. You fucking listen to me." Bert grabs a handful of Frank's hair and pulls, twisting his other hand in the front of Frank's shirt and forcing Frank to look at him. "It's not. Going. To happen. To you. You know why not? Because I'm not going to fucking let it. I shouldn't give a shit, that's gotta count for something, right? Fucking up the dominant paradigm or what the fuck ever? If me being – "

He stops.

"If I'm enough to keep you alive, I'm gonna fucking do it," he says quietly.

Comprehension, or something like it, sparks in Frank.

" _Oh_ ," he breathes, wide-eyed and more shocked than Bert's ever seen him. "Oh, _fuck_. It was him, wasn't it? You told _Gerard_ you wouldn't let me die." He says it like a revelation, like the answer, but with a dark, bloody thread of hurt running through it.

Bert hesitates. Frank isn't wrong, but he isn't right either. It's not like Bert didn't know about Frank and Gerard, fuck, but it's all still there in Frank's voice, laid bare like he's proud of it, his heart on his sleeve and inked in two halves on his hands.

"You would have too," Bert says, not knowing why he feels like he has to defend himself. "He was so fucking scared, shit. He knew it was happening." – _pale and weak, hair faded and lank and sticking to his clammy forehead, clinging like a child and begging not to have to die alone_ – "So fucking _scared_ ," Bert repeats hollowly. "Like you've never seen him. You would've."

Silence but for the traffic. Bert watches the scene play out behind Frank's eyelids.

"I didn't enjoy it or anything, you know," Bert says, as Frank lets out a long breath and grinds the heels of his hands into his eyes. "I fucking hated it." _At first, anyway. I didn't see what he saw in you_. "I thought you were a real dick. Only thing that made it better was getting to beat the shit out of you."

Frank snorts. "You're fucking charming. Anyone ever tell you that?"

"All the time. _Everyone_ loves me."

"I don't."

"Yeah, I know." Bert opens his mouth again to tell Frank the feeling is mutual, but the words don't come. Somewhere between then and now, things have shifted. He's turned out his pockets and found none of his original ulterior motives.

Frank inhales sharply. "Hated," he says. "Didn't. Thought. _Made_ it better. Past tense. You don't..." he trails off, uneasy, unsure. The line of his shoulders is sharp and tense.

Bert says nothing.

"Bert?" Frank pushes, an edge seeping into his voice. "Come on, man, what's this really about?"

Bert forces a laugh, brushes it off, elbows Frank teasingly in the ribs. "I said that?" he says. "You hit your head again? Didn't mean a thing by it, fucker. You know I'm just a guy who keeps his promises."

"Sure. Right." Frank pushes himself away from the wall and stands, stretching like a cat and rolling his head back. Bert traces his profile, the slant of his nose and the brush of the streetlamps' brassy yellow light on his cheekbones and the dusty indigo shadow under the line of his jaw. Frank laughs, relief in every note of it. Bert unfolds his legs from under him and gets up, feeling the blood throbbing where the bruises are going to be. Frank's smile is easy, fractionally lopsided, his lip split and his teeth a little bloody. He claps Bert on the shoulder.

"I gotta go," he says. "There's a party where no one's even drunk yet on the other side of town. Someone's gotta gatecrash, right?" He quirks an eyebrow – conspirator, inviting Bert out from the cold and in on the joke. Bert promises himself that the ache is just the bruises.

"Sure. Go fuck shit up. Give 'em hell, and all that." _Take me with you. I want to gatecrash too. I want to pick your fights and have your back. I want to distract the host while you spike the punch. I want to give you something to get you buzzed, want to watch you dance to whatever shitty music they're playing. I want to watch you make out with girls with boyfriends and then kiss their boyfriends too, just to fuck with them, just because you can. I want to kick a couple out of a bedroom and leave the door open while I get you off. I want_ –

"Later, man." Frank throws Bert an ironic, two-fingered salute and a lazy, vulpine smile, and then he's gone. The noise of his sneakers on the sidewalk fades until Bert can no longer pick it out of the mess of rhythms of cityafterdark.

"Later," he says to an empty street. "Right."

He walks away.


End file.
